Updates

Loungers

June 2023

Investing in shares may lose you all or some of your money. Past performance is no indication of future performance. Some of the shares recommended here may be small company shares, which can be relatively illiquid and hard to trade and this makes such shares more risky than other investments.

Momentum continues to run hot for casual dining group Loungers with three-year like-for-like sales (against pre-pandemic comps) improving from 17% in H1 to 17.6% over the full year. H2 alone was +11.8%. The latest menu with much dish innovation has been well received. The group added 29 new outlets (24 Lounges, four Cosy Clubs and one Brightside), plus three freehold sites were acquired for conversion, yet net debt only rose from £2.6m to £6.2m. The expansion rate will increase to a scorching 35 sites p.a. from FY’24. While sales are running slightly ahead of expectations, Peel Hunt has downgraded EBITDA forecasts by 5% to £49.7m for ‘24 due to higher costs; the bugbear is that while it hedged energy from May 2020 w ...

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Sureserve - Agrees take-over: gain to date +47%

Volution

Loungers - Agreed bid at 310p; gain 172% (January 2025)

Loungers (December 2024)

Loungers - Opening 35 casual dining outlets annually there’s plenty of runway to 665 target (September 2024)

Loungers (June 2024)

Loungers - Strong trading delivers new upgrade (January 2024)

Loungers - Like-for-like sales accelerate to almost 10% (December 2023)

Loungers - Roll-out target upped from 400 to 600 (September 2023)

Loungers (February 2023)

Loungers - Accelerating new openings from 24 to 32 as it eyes 500 outlets (September 2022)

Loungers (June 2022)

Loungers (February 2022)

Loungers (January 2021)

Loungers (December 2020)

Loungers (October 2020)

Loungers - Best-in-class cafe bar group looks set to beat forecasts (September 2020)

Loungers - New issue moves to healthy premium (June 2019)

With small companies there is an above average degree of risk compared to buying blue chips. Please be aware that we have not assessed the suitability of any of these investments for you. The newsletter simply states a personal view and diarises the editor’s investment decisions. Please speak to your stockbroker or other qualified individual to ascertain whether any of these companies mentioned would form useful additions to your own portfolios. Past performance is no indication of future success.

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